A few months the longtime Iron Maiden drummer Nicko McBrain (71) revealed that he suffered a stroke last january and was paralyzed from the right side of his shoulder on down. He was worried that his drumming career would be over but he managed to recover about 70% of his mobility and of course, is on the road with Maiden right now. McBrain joined Iron Maiden back in 1982 and has been their drummer for the last four decades.
In an interview with Eddie Trunk (Transcribed by Blabbermouth), the musician who recently played with the band in the United States said that he is almost 100% recovered.
Nicko McBrain says he is almost 100% recovered from stroke
“It’s going great. It started off a little shaky for me, but as the time (went on) and the more shows we performed, I started to get a little bit more strength and they’d been really rocking out well. And the last couple of months have been fantastic.”
“(I’m) doing good (right now). I’m still probably — I’d say I’m 85 to 90 percent back to strength, but I still have a little less dexterity with speed in my fingers. My fingers are the ones that — this is the last thing to strengthen up. But I had to change certain drum fills. Some fills that everybody knows me for on certain songs, I’ve had to improvise those at rehearsals to be able to actually play the songs.”
He contiuned:
“So now I’m starting to actually be able to kind of embrace it a bit more. And I can’t do that live. I have to wait until we start doing some rehearsals again or whatever it is. But I’m definitely getting stronger. And I’ve had great support from (Maiden manager) Rod (Smallwood), the band, and all of the fans out there. They’ve been absolutely — they’ve shown me so much love, it’s amazing,” Nicko McBrain said.